


The Good Samaritan (No 106) Re-Imagined

by angeladex



Series: Dysfunctional Teen Mutant Club [17]
Category: The Blacklist (US TV), X-Men Evolution
Genre: "The Good Samaritan" Blacklist, All that's really important for you to be familiar with is that specific season 1 episode, Canon-Typical Violence, Childhood Trauma, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Dissociation, Dysfunctional Teen Mutant Club, F/M, Flashbacks, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jack Winter's A+ parenting, Let Scott swear, Mentions past trauma, Multi, Past Child Abuse, Past Domestic Violence, Post XME Canon, Regarding The Blacklist...I don't even go here?, Scott had a shitty childhood, Scott/Jean/Rogue...kindasorta, Serial Killer, crime/thriller elements, using dissociation to cope
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-12
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 07:21:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28899573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angeladex/pseuds/angeladex
Summary: Blacklist (1x11) and X-Men: Evolution (post-series) crossover. Because I can. Join Elizabeth Keen as she goes after a serial killer: The Good Samaritan. She gets some unlikely help from Scott Summers. How does he figure into this? Follows canon of both universes, with the exception of the murder victim. Character death warning, but he's an awful person, so who cares? tw: past abuse
Relationships: Jean Grey/Rogue/Scott Summers, Jean Grey/Scott Summers, Rogue/Scott Summers
Series: Dysfunctional Teen Mutant Club [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1935622
Comments: 3
Kudos: 5





	1. The Alaskan Tourist

It was late. They called New York the City that Never Sleeps, but the back-alley areas—the ones Karl knew; the ones that still serviced public pay phones and always _always_ had a place for him to park the van because they were far enough away from the main roads—where there were only streetlights that bore witness as he unhurriedly depressed the keys in the pay phone—9-1-1. No surveillance cameras, here. The buildings were abandoned, under permanent construction, or condemned.

_“911, what’s your emergency?”_

“I’ve done it again,” Karl said, and then dropped the phone, ignoring the questions the voice was asking, trying to get more information. 

Only the streetlights bore witness as he walked away. The streetlights, and perhaps the bleeding, mostly dead man in the van he was abandoning. Avoiding anywhere with a camera for at least three blocks before deeming it safe enough to hail a taxi home.

The van had already been wiped clean. It wasn’t connected to him at all. Hospitals had dozens—hundreds—of vehicles used to transport prone patients. It attracted too much attention to try and get his hands on an ambulance. But the kinds of vans regularly used to taxi hospice patients? Karl hadn’t even had to try hard to get one. They kept the ones they “retired” in a special lot, and he knew which one. Knew where the keys were, too.

This one had been forever working out, too. He oughtn’t have done it, really. It was…a special case. In more than one way. File appropriation had been the hardest part; lots of red tape. Because he was a mutant. Karl had never done a mutant, before. 

Then had been his own deductions. The files were more than five years old. He had to determine which were useful and which…weren’t. That part hadn’t been hard. He had public record to help him, there, though it had been annoying appropriating them from the original location, which was hundreds of miles and several time zones away.

He’d done it, though. And all legit. Nothing suspicious would be linked to him. He’d been careful.

He’d appropriated a special drug. Worked like a charm. His supplier had said it was poison to mutants—even through skin-contact—but harmless to anyone else. (The supplier had never seen his face. Karl had been careful, with this one.)

Karl had diluted it, experimented with it. Because the bastard in the van? Deserved everything he got. And being offed by poison would have been too easy.

Karl had just used enough of it to keep him disoriented. While Karl did his work.

In the taxi, giving his address to the driver, Karl saw the flashing lights of the police cars. An ambulance passed them by, siren blaring.

He’d done it. If they got there soon, the man in the van might even survive.

Karl put it from his mind.

In truth, he’d stopped worrying at all before he’d even dialed the phone.

* * *

Scott awakened with his alarm, not before, sporting a headache; he was initially grateful for the distraction from his wrist, which he’d recently broken, but tugged on a pair of shoes awkwardly, leaving the confines of the Institute as quickly as humanly possible, opening his day with a run. This served several purposes: One: it made Jean stop nagging him. She worried that he would pine for her while she was at school, and she worried less when he told her he’d taken up running, again.

Two: it honestly did help the headaches. Keeping his eyes shut for long periods of time (say, for a solid 6 hours of sleep?) had been…harder on him, lately, than usual. His mutation (‘concussive optic blasts,’ the Professor called them, even as Scott still fondly referred to them as ‘eyeball bazookas’) drew energy from sunlight. The Professor and Mr. McCoy had theorized _ad nauseum_ about the particulars, but Scott just knew his body. He’d never been one to sleep for long. He’d been waking up to headaches since he was…about thirteen years old.

Three: If he timed it right, Scott could avoid Logan’s perpetual offer for Scott to help him with Danger Room Maintenance.

And most importantly, Four: If he timed it even better, Scott would arrive back from running as Jean was leaving for class, and she’d admitted to him that seeing him all exhausted and sweaty was a tiny bit sexy.

That accomplished, Scott proceeded to cool down, doing some stretches as he made his way slowly back to his room. When they’d turned eighteen and graduated, Professor Xavier had offered them jobs with him. This had included and not been limited to new rooms, in the ‘Staff’ wing of the mansion. Where Scott’s room was next to Logan’s and Mr. McCoy’s, and Jean’s was a few doors down, next to Ororo’s.

It had been…interesting. The Professor explained that it was just…nicer. Legally. To do this. Since by and large the façade of the Institute was that of a ‘campus.’ Even if they attended public school, the students had always been subjected to Institute rules. Boys in one wing, girls in another. (And the ‘headmaster’ was a telepath. See how often _those_ boundaries were breached.) Turning eighteen, being legally considered adults, it was…less appropriate for them to remain in the student wings.

Scott, who had always been very ‘grown up’ and responsible in his time at the Institute, had noticed the shift. It was…small things. Mr. McCoy had been commenting, lately, that they were colleagues, now, and that Scott could call him ‘Hank,’ as such. (Scott still struggled with this, though Logan and Ororo had long since stopped being ‘Ms. Munroe and Mr. Logan’ to him.) Scott and Jean were included in Staff rotation of things like fire safety, student progress planning, and Danger Room demos (though Scott remained unclear if Logan actually meant demo as in ‘demonstration’ or demo as in ‘demolition,’ and he’d been here for going on 3 years.)

Jean noticed it, too, but in her own way. She said she felt less _presence_ in her mind. The Professor had always kept a lowkey tab on all of his students. (In enabled him to be able to know if and when they were in trouble, or even communicate directly with their mind, as he’d had to do over the years.) But with his Staff, he allowed them the freedom to…exist without his presence.

Scott didn’t feel any difference, but Jean insisted it was there. And he was likely to trust her, these days, because her powers had been growing, and had only been stronger since the Apocalypse debacle.

It was Wednesday, so Jean had her class at NYU and Scott usually taught at the Institute after school got out for the students. He’d had careful stacks of lesson plans to follow, but had decided last night to be a little lax—Professor Xavier had mentioned that Jubilation was returning to school, and would be arriving a little later. Ororo and the Professor were picking her up from the airport, and Logan was subbing Ororo’s outdoor obstacle course training. The kids didn’t need a physics quiz on top of that.

An awkward shower later, his disgusting cast shoved into a plastic bag over his left wrist as he performed the already complicated mechanics of showering with his eyes closed, Scott opted for clothing with as few buttons as possible, getting to breakfast with still-damp hair, thanking Bobby for his orange juice and downing the anti-inflammatories he’d been stuck with since his stupid wrist had broken, as well as an aspirin for his headache.

The nurse had said the break was at risk for developing bone-spurs, which sucked, because he’d broken this same wrist before. That had been a fun conversation. Trying to tell the nurse details about the last time he’d broken this wrist, five years ago. Another of the injuries he’d gotten because of the unfortunate case of ‘living with an abusive asshole’ he’d contracted when he was thirteen.

Jean hadn’t thought that was funny. Scott’s humor was wasted on these people.

Logan turned up the volume on the television; a special report about a serial killer still on the loose over in the city. The media called him the “Good Samaritan,” because he didn’t kill his victims. He always called 911. Allowed first responders the chance to save their lives.

“We’ve just received word that the latest victim died early this morning. He was admitted to Bellevue Hospital Center with multiple broken bones and evidence of blunt force trauma to his liver and kidneys. The victim is fifty-six-year-old John Smith, according to his Driver’s License, a tourist visiting from Anchorage, Alaska. No next-of-kin has been found to inform…”

How might the course of his day been changed, had Scott not glanced up, then? Maybe not much. Especially considering what ended up happening later.

But he did.

The news reporter was sharing a corner of her screen for the driver’s license photo of the victim.

The kids didn’t notice Scott’s reaction. Didn’t bat an eye. Kurt called for anyone who needed a ride to meet him by the X-van. Kitty grabbed an apple for the road.

Rogue saw. And Logan.

“Oh, shit,” Rogue said, because Scott’s memories had lived in her head, before.

She knew who he was. Who he…had been?

‘John Smith,’ as his ID called him, was actually one of the many aliases used by Jack Winters.

Scott’s former foster father.

* * *

The building was poorly lit and in dire need of an upgrade. It smelled fine, considering…well. There were no “patients” in the mortuary. Just…cadavers.

Ressler had ridden along with Elizabeth, keeping remarkable pace with her, despite his pronounced limp and the cane he carried. They didn’t talk…the mole. They didn’t talk betrayal, or Raymond Reddington, or the emergency surgery Ressler had undergone at his hands, a few weeks ago. They didn’t talk about Tom, or their personal lives.

God, it was nice. Ressler was good, like that. They could talk personal lives, but he also knew when to just…keep it about work.

They talked Good Samaritan, though. Quite a bit about him. And there was a bit to talk about, even without the most recent case file in front of her. The way Ressler had led the manhunt on Reddington was the same way Liz had been about the Good Samaritan.

“So you’ve been there since the beginning?” Ressler asked, and it wasn’t trite, with him. It wasn’t making chitchat. (It might have been, a little, because they both knew the gigantic Goddamn elephant in the room they were dancing around, but if he could do it, so could she, damnit.)

“Nearly. I rode lead on the case after the…third victim, I think.” She didn’t think. She knew. They had only started to recognize the pattern after the third victim. The one who’d died in Liz’s arms.

“So. Tell me. Our guy. What do you got on the victims?” he asked. He was actually setting the pace, now. Trying to prove he was the job. Even now. God, she loved Ressler. He was a great partner.

“Seven, so far,” she answered immediately. “All different ages, incomes. He always acted unpredictably. We could never figure out his trigger, only that he’s trying to make a statement.” This was what they were sure about. What made it serial. A lot of the markers didn’t hit. He was methodical, but the victims’ injuries were never…identical. Just..precise.

“What kind of a statement?” Ressler asked. He was playing into her hands. Letting her show off. What had she done to deserve how nice he was being, today? Maybe he was just in a good mood.

“He never kills his victims. He always calls 911, allows first responders a chance to save their lives. That’s why the papers call him The Good Samaritan.”

They were silent as they spoke with the mortician. They looked over the body of the latest victim, who still hadn’t been identified. They were looking for a next-of-kin to claim him.

What did make this one different—and this was what hadn’t made it to the papers—was that the man had been a mutant. The gene had been verified. It was hard to identify powers; nothing in the bloodwork to give any hints. But the blood alone told them a fair bit.

There were several kinds of mutants, and several kinds of mutations, of course. And this man had been a rarer type; an ‘Alpha’ mutant. It was clear, from his gene, that he had been given—in potential, at least—two powers. It might have been that he wasn’t aware of both of them, or that one of them had been dormant. That wasn’t something they could tell by blood and DNA alone. Most mutants who exhibited a power were low-to-high level ‘Beta’ mutants. Still others had different classifications. Those whose powers weren’t awakened until later in life, or those whose powers were awakened by strange means—Liz had read about a group of astronauts caught in some kind of cosmic storm in space, and all had miraculously manifested powers as a result; they might have gone their whole lives with that dormant x-gene, had this event not occurred.

Liz was still thinking about it when she went home, later that night. Tom wasn’t there—of course he wasn’t there. He’d said he was leaving to go to Nebraska, for that job interview.

She took a call from an unknown number, when she felt it vibrating in the pocket of her jacket. She did it because in her line of work…it could be anyone. The President. Mr. Kaplan. Reddington himself.

“Hello?”

“Lizzy.”

Ah. Reddington himself. Think of the Devil and he will appear.

“Where are you?” she asked sharply.

“I read about that gentleman they found in New York. Sounded awfully familiar.” He didn’t answer her question. He claimed he didn’t lie to her, but this was how he managed that. He avoided questions. “The Good Samaritan,” he continued. “Are you back on the case, I hope?”

“They’re going to find you,” Liz said. She could avoid his questions, too.

“This one’s important to you, isn’t he?” Red asked. Because of course he did. “Why? What on earth happened?”

Liz breathed into the phone, rolling her eyes.

“I only ask on the chance that I may be able to help,” Red said. Like he could see her frustration.

Liz bit. She put down her purse. Settled into her couch. “One of the earliest victims…She died in my arms,” Liz said. Facts. Methodical. Stoic. She was putting on her ‘cold bitch’ face for this, because she couldn’t be emotional. “There was nothing I could do to stop it.”

“You missed something, didn’t you?” Red never missed a trick. His voice was smooth. Low and confident. He knew this answer already. The bastard.

“Serial killers escalate. This one doesn’t,” Liz replied, almost defensively. “The victims and methods vary. I could never see the pattern…The profile. Still can’t.”

“I don’t know about serial killers,” Red said to that—it was the tone of voice he used when scolding her for thinking too much like a cop, and not enough like a criminal. To catch a criminal, she had to think like a criminal. “But I do know about torture,” he continued. “And there is no one-size-fits-all. If you really want to hurt someone, you need to tailor your attack specifically to that person.”

It was like he was in her brain with her. She’d been thinking this. Because the victim was a mutant. The attacks on him would had to have taken that into account.

“This victim was a mutant,” Liz blurted. “None of the other victims was one. What does that mean?”

Red, as ever, was evasive. “Perhaps the killer’s methods, the injuries he inflicts, tell you less about him and more about his victims.”

Liz stewed with that thought in her head.

“I got to go,” Red said then, with no fanfare.

The phone didn’t click. He didn’t hang up on her. But there was a loud _clack_ that came over the speaker, and she suspected he’d just thrown the phone out, somewhere.

Liz didn’t think well without resources. She didn’t even bother taking her jacket off. She just picked up her purse and her keys, and left. She had research to do about some victims.


	2. Realizations

Logan was talking. Probably saying something important.

Scott didn’t hear a word.

He was staring at the television.

It had been turned off. There had been other stories, other things that were mildly interesting, maybe. It had been rude of Logan to turn the TV off. What if Scott wanted to know about the governmental policy change or the new sports drink?

He didn’t. He gave exactly zero fucks about any of it.

Jack. He was dead.

“B-bastard used that f-f-fake ID when I was f-f-f-fourteen,” Scott said. It was true. He remembered Jack pulling it out to register Scott for school. Scott hadn’t left school, yet.

_Scott hadn’t gone to school, once his eyes stopped turning off. He’d missed the latter half of eighth grade, and most of freshman year._

“Scott? What d’ya want us t’do?”

Scott had lost time, maybe. People talking to him. At him. That was Rogue.

A hand was holding his right hand. The one without the cast. A hand—smaller than his own, wearing a leather glove. Rogue. It was Rogue. He squeezed it, for something to do. Something to…react to.

Because he couldn’t react to this.

Jack was _dead_. And he’d been _murdered_ by a serial killer.

“Scott. D’ya hear us? Say somethin.’”

Female. Accent. Southern. Not Ororo. Rogue again. It made sense. Rogue was holding his hand.

Were others talking?

He lost more time. He was—where was he? He was looking up, now, at the ceiling, instead of at the blank television screen.

Jack. Jack was dead. Like, _dead_.

“Scott? Scott?”

_Scott?_

He blinked when the voice was in his head. It wasn’t Jean. So it didn’t matter.

He ignored it.

Why was he on the ground, now? He must have tried to get up, before. And not been up for it.

He tried to bring himself back. Just a little. Just to see what was going on, beyond the blank silence where Scott was.

Gloved hand squeezing his right hand. Rogue.

The casted hand resting on a purple lap. Likely Ororo. He didn’t know anyone else whose lap would be purple.

Oh. Oh, _man_ , his left arm hurt. Hurt like a motherfucker.

There wasn’t sound. He didn’t hear sound. But he had enough to be getting on with.

Jesus. Jack was _dead_. Broken bones and blunt force kidneys, or something. Probably other things the news lady hadn’t said. Stuff that mightn’t be suitable for the morning news crowd.

No next of kin.

That…that…

That fucker.

That absolute motherfucking bastard.

No next of kin. No one to inform that he was dead.

Well, they’d told Scott. Scott knew.

_I’m so sorry, Scott. They just told me._

Jean. Jean’s voice broke easily through the silence. He sat up.

“Jean?” he heard his voice say it. Felt Rogue’s hand. _Squeeze_. Felt Ororo’s hand. _Pat, pat_.

_I’m coming. I’m finding an exit._

Relief. Glorious relief. He actually smiled. Well, probably. He felt his face move. It was maybe his mouth. But it didn’t matter. He didn’t have to say anything. Didn’t have to explain _anything_. Jean was coming. She’d be here in a little under an hour. Less, if traffic was kind. And she _already knew_.

She knew him like he knew himself. Like he knew her. She’d been in his head when he’d had nightmares, his first few months here. She’d bonded with his mind and been with him, when Mystique had kidnapped him, or when the Juggernaut had overcome Scott’s optic blasts—when no one had ever done that, before, and Scott had felt…a little impressed, before being shaken like a ragdoll and losing consciousness.

“Scott. Is Jean comin’?”

Rogue. Scott heard her. “Y-yeah,” he answered. It was immediate. Or almost immediate. No lost time. He didn’t think.

He still felt leather-clad fingers squeezing his hand.

“What. What d’you wanna do? Whahle we wait for her?”

Action. Action of some kind was needed. Scott blinked, under his glasses.

Assess.

He was sitting on the floor. His headache was…not gone. But slightly less. The anti-inflammatory was working on his head, at least, if it hadn’t reached his wrist.

Rogue. Rogue was holding his hand. The good one. The bad one hurt like a motherfucker. Ororo was holding the cast in her lap. He could see her fingers on the hardened blue gauze. It didn’t feel…swollen. Or hot. Like it usually did, when it hurt this much.

Oh. Ororo.

Ororo was good with temperature. Even body temperature. Years of sunburned summers had been made tolerable in her presence.

Rogue on his right. Ororo on his left. He turned, then, somehow unsurprised to see the Professor there, leaning toward him, seated in his wheelchair.

A quick glance around the room easily located Logan, standing near the door, and Mr. McCoy, behind the Professor. There, but not hovering.

Assess.

Rogue. Rogue was missing school for this. For him. She was graduating, this year. She was applying to colleges. She shouldn’t miss school.

“Sh-sh-shouldn’t you b-be in s-s-school?” he said.

Oh. Oh shit. He hadn’t noticed the stuttering.

“Shouldn’t you be sittin’ at the table eatin’ breakfast, an’ not down here?” she replied easily. She didn’t acknowledge it. The stutter.

_Waking up with a blindfold tied cruelly tight. Head throbbing with every move he made. Jack had promised to beat the stutter out of him. A punch for every sound he repeated._

“H-h-h-how rude of me,” Scott tried to joke. He felt odd. Disjointed. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

“Ah wasn’t gonna say nothin,’” Rogue bantered—she was sitting demurely as could be allowed with her tight leather mini. “Not mah place t’tell y’all how t’live your lahves.” Her hands belied her casual, joking tone. She was holding him tight, like she was being tethered to the earth because of him alone.

Rogue…knew him, too. Because of her power. She’d shared a nightmare or two with him, felt how it felt to use his powers. They’d done their fair share of awkward soul-baring and apologies, over the years.

And she hadn’t let go of his hand once.

“W-w-will you c-c-come?” Scott asked—blurted, really, without any context for the question.

“What’m ah comin’ to?” Rogue answered easily, agreeing automatically.

Rogue was…pretty great.

“J-J-J-Jean’ll know,” Scott kept his words short. Less chance to stutter, that way. “W-w-w-where, I m-mean. We-we-we’re gonna b-be his next of k-kin.”

Rogue frowned. “Why?”

Scott opened his mouth, and shut it, when he realized how long it would take for him to say what he wanted to. So he settled for, “If n-n-nobody c-claims him, he g-g-gets an unm-m-marked g-g-g-grave.”

“Fine by me,” Rogue growled.

Scott smiled. She meant it. She meant it with her whole being.

* * *

Liz had a stack of medical files three victims thick when she finally caught a lucky break.

Well…sort of.

Someone had come forward as John Smith’s next of kin.

She wrote down the important information from the call, not knowing where to go, from that point.

Two pieces of information felt important enough to pursue.

One: The victim’s name had been an alias. John Smith was actually Jack Winters, and he had a rap sheet twenty years and two countries long.

Two: The next-of-kin was legally an adult, so she was given his name, too: Scott Summers.

It was a hunch, she thought, later. Just a lucky coincidence.

Raymond Reddington didn’t believe in coincidences.

Elizabeth Keen was starting to think she didn’t, either.

She looked up the kid. She had no reason to do so. Other than that hunch.

News clippings dating back the last decade—he’d been part of that giant robot attack on New York, as well as the weird thing with the pyramids last year. Further back: he’d been implicated in some destruction at a school near Westchester. Further back: he’d been outright responsible for damages done to a hospital in Anchorage. Kid had been sixteen. Admitted with complaints of blurred vision and burning in his eyes. Kid was a mutant, too. Bazooka-d the roof off the hospital, it looked like, because he had some kind of laser vision. Further back: he’d been declared a ward of the state of Alaska at eight years old—the survivor of a plane crash that had killed his family.

Random public record stuff: a matriculation announcement, some kind of…math award. He’d gotten in high school.

Privilege of being FBI: shared data. Reports concerning details of his mutant powers, courtesy of some government branch Liz had never heard of: who or what was S.H.I.E.L.D?

Medical records: a recent broken wrist. Further back: broken ribs. Bruised liver and kidneys. Further back: laceration to his head; needed stitches. Further back: admitted with complaint of migraine. Treated for concussion due to head trauma. Further back: broken wrist, again. The same one he’d just re-broken. Internal stress fracture. It had needed re-breaking before being casted, because it had started to mend wrong—he hadn’t been admitted for the injury until nearly a month after it had occurred.

Dates. Liz looked at dates.

All of the injuries—excepting this recent broken wrist, which had happened a month ago—had been recorded as happening within a span of three years. And the hospital visits had ceased abruptly with the visit where he destroyed the hospital, when he was sixteen.

Liz blinked in the sudden, quite obvious revelation: Scott Summers had been abused.

And then she gasped at the secondary revelation, when her eyes found the medical records already in front of her: Every single fracture; every injury that boy had in that three-year period…the killer gave to Winters.

She needed to get a meeting with this kid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Taking from comic-canon, to merge with XME canon, as is my way. I also have those XME Comics, which I consider canon to the XME universe, where I get specific ages and places relative to this universe. Whereas the Evo universe doesn't mention Jack Winters or Mister Sinister as being connected to Scott at all...in the comics, they are. 
> 
> In my head, the merged-Evo and comic canon puts Scott with jack from the age of 13-16. (Scott is canon 16 when he meets the professor, and when season 1 of XME starts.)
> 
> This chapter is a tad shorter, and we're finally gonna see Liz and Scott meet next chapter, but the extra buildup was necessary, methinks.
> 
> Let me know what you think!


	3. The Pattern

Scott was uneasy, and he felt Rogue’s gloved hand gripping his right hand tightly, and felt Jean—the ghost of a presence in his mind, soothing the headache, which had only grown worse, offsetting his achy broken wrist. Jean was there physically, too, and Scott had detected absolutely no animosity between the two; usually there was at least a little, on Rogue’s part.

He was almost glad his breakdown had brought them together.

They had been asked in a not-really-asking kind of way if they would mind relocating from the morgue to an FBI site nearby to answer some questions for the investigators on the case, after they’d filled out some rudimentary paperwork and done the actual identification thing.

That. That had been some real shit, there.

It was Jack. Older, a little fatter. But definitely Jack. Paler. Deader. But Jack.

Scott had just confirmed the identification, stuttering like anything, and left the room in under a minute.

Jean knew when the feds—the ‘agents’— were…stretching the truth. _Yes, it’s stretching the truth, Scott, everyone stretches the truth. It’s much nicer than thinking everyone’s a liar, now isn’t it?_ She had assured him that everything was mostly on the level. Only the place they were going was actually a black site, so they’d probably offer them a ride in a car without windows.

Oh, joy.

Scott had agreed, only on the condition that all of them went, which was met with no trouble.

Rogue didn’t talk, much. But she hadn’t let go of his hand. Not once. And it was just…so nice.

“We thank you for your cooperation,” one of the suits said, in a way that Scott suspected meant he really meant ‘future cooperation,’ which was confirmed when they verified Jean’s insight that they would not be allowed to drive to the site themselves.

“We are more than happy to drive you there, and then drive you back, to pick up your vehicle,” the man said.

Scott just nodded. He couldn’t stutter a nod.

He didn’t know, really, what about this all was so…freaky. Jean was there, lightly, a presence in his mind like she usually was, offering him comfort, and he knew that she would be able to talk this out with him later, and that she had some ideas about the chaos that was happening in his brain. More than he himself had, likely, because this seemed to be some subconscious programming that had kicked in, and for the life of him, Scott _couldn’t_ lessen the anxiety he felt. It was there, coiled in his gut.

Rogue seemed to know, intuitively, when it was starting to drag him under, again. Like it had before. It wouldn’t get that bad again—not with Jean here—but Rogue squeezed his hand again, or rubbed her thumb over his knuckles, and it was enough. He was here. He was present. He was far from alone.

His headache was mostly gone, now, probably from the distraction of him not thinking about it, letting Jean do her thing. He shot her a smile. She smoothed his hair, which looked slightly worse for the wear—he’d never actually combed it, after showering this morning, and it had dried in a way that was similar to how he styled his hair normally—hair muscle-memory, maybe—but a little…frazzled. Like…bedhead Scott. ‘I tried and failed to make my hair edgy on purpose’ Scott.

They were escorted into the building in a way that Scott was uneasy with—he had always prided himself on his sense of direction, and he didn’t even know which way was North or South, or where he was located, really. He started to sketch a building design in the back of his head, anyway, like he usually did. He automatically made maps in his head of buildings he entered. This was something that had helped him more than once.

And then they were in an office. It could have been any normal office. Scott’s therapist had an office designed similarly. Phones rang in the background, the lighting was pleasant, not harsh or cheap, like at the morgue.

It didn’t smell like death, either, which was definitely a plus. 

It was almost 9:30 in the morning, so there was the comforting thought that, at least they’d probably be done before lunchtime. Maybe they could hit a greasy burger joint. Rogue would back him up. Jean was athletic, and very health-conscientious, but Rogue hadn’t shaken her southern roots, and could never resist deep-fried something delicious.

There was a padded bench, and Scott sat in the middle. Rogue took her place on his right, and Jean took her place on his left.

They were promptly joined by two different agents; the old ones who’d driven them here had left. Now, there was a red-haired man who matched height with Scott, but came in limping heavily, reliant on a cane, and a woman about Rogue’s height, wearing shiny black boots under a black pantsuit and the kind of look on her face that Scott imagined he himself wore; calculating. Assessing.

He had the advantage of sunglasses to hide it, though. This woman didn’t.

The man sat across from them, stretching out his left leg, and resting his cane on it. The woman sat off to the side, closest to the door they’d come in by. Going by body language alone, the man would be speaking with them. The man was in charge.

 _She’s riding lead. The woman. It’s a feint_ , Jean informed him—and he knew, in the way he couldn’t explain, that Rogue had been looped in to the insight, too.

“Thank you so much for coming. My name is Donald Ressler,” the man said, offering a smile that didn’t show any teeth, but not offering a handshake. Interesting. _It’s their protocol, since mutants were outed. They have your files, so they know your powers, Scott, but they don’t know what mine or Rogue’s power is. No handshakes for us_.

 _Ah’ll give him a handshake if he asks nahce_.

Scott grinned, hearing Rogue’s drawl even in their heads.

“This is my partner, Elizabeth Keen,” the man continued; he gestured to his partner with just his head before continuing on, all business. “We just had some questions to ask. We’re on the task force assigned to find the person who killed Jack Winters.”

 _They’ve done their homework_ , Scott couldn’t help but note. The media had called him ‘John Smith.’ And they very carefully hadn’t connected Jack to Scott. They hadn’t referred to him as Scott’s father or foster-father, or anything.

They probably knew what kind of asshole they were dealing with, then.

“S-S-Scott S-Summers,” Scott eked out, frowning. “Th-th-this is J-J-Jean. And R-R-Rogue,” he nodded to his companions, too.

“We’re following a lead,” the man—Ressler—said, back to business. “And had some questions about your medical history, if that’s all right, Mr. Summers.”

 _The woman’s a profiler. Ooh, I don’t like her very much_ , Jean contributed.

“What kahnda questions? Ah don’t see that’s relevant,” Rogue cut in, narrowing her eyes. Showing facial expressions that Scott didn’t. Couldn’t. Behind his glasses.

“Your records show quite a bit of hospital time, in a span of three years,” the woman—Keen? Was it?— said by way of answer. “We had questions about those injuries, specifically. This was about…six or seven years ago.”

_It’s related to the murder. Something about matching injuries._

“That’s…um…that’s not…” Scott tried, and was surprised when he didn’t stutter. Well…it wasn’t the same, anyway. But neither could he say anything else. He had submerged. It was like there was pressure in his head. Like being underwater. He lost time. Moments? Minutes?

Rogue’s other hand gripped his right arm. “Scott?”

He surfaced, and it tasted distinctly of Jean, and apology and concern.

“It was…j-j-just…I dunno. B-b-broken b-b-bones. J-j-just s-s-skin,” Scott found himself saying. And it didn’t make sense, really. But…it did.

It was maybe…the most real thing he’d ever said aloud about the time he’d spent with Jack. All that needed saying.

“How’d that happen?” Ressler interrupted, then. He pointed at Scott’s cast.

“That…that was s-something else,” Scott said, lifting the offending arm. “F-Fender bender. You should s-see my c-c-car. T-t-t-travesty, is w-what it is.” His attempt at humor wasn’t really funny, but Ressler, to his credit, cracked a smirk. “Th-the n-n-nurse s-said the b-b-bone was w-w-weak. I b-b-broke this s-same wrist when—when I was th-th-thirteen.”

“How’d it happen when you were thirteen?” Keen asked.

“G-Got in a f-f-fight,” Scott muttered. “A f-f-friend of J-J-J—” Scott couldn’t say the name. He was going to choke on the ‘J.’ “T-Tony,” he said instead. “His n-name was T-Tony. He b-broke it.”

“And…you broke your ribs, and bruised your liver and kidneys?”

Scott didn’t even know who’d asked. There was pressure, again, and he just wanted to sink underwater.

“G-g-got k-k-k-kicked,” Scott choked out, remaining present. “J-J-J-Jack,” he finally pushed the name through his struggling mouth. “He…he kicked…h-h-hard.”

“Hospital record said it was an accident with a sledge-hammer.” This from Keen, again. Though she was contradicting him, her tone was still very non-confrontational. And Jean didn’t call bullshit. She was clarifying facts, was all.

“I w-was a k-k-kid,” Scott muttered. “Th-that’s what the s-s-story was.”

“Jack Winters was a mutant. One of his powers was to harden the surface of his skin with diamonds. His kicks probably could look like a sledge-hammer,” Jean intercepted graciously, as Rogue leaned her head on Scott’s shoulder, still gripping his hand, and moving her other hand up to rub his arm, all done very gracefully without touching skin.

She knew. Rogue knew like Jean knew, about how touch kept Scott grounded.

About how much worse the stutter could get, if he was agitated.

When had that happened? When had Rogue gotten to know Scott so well?

“ _One_ of his powers?” Ressler asked. “Did he have others?”

“Some mutants have more than one. Alpha-level mutants, they’re called,” Jean said, and her voice was calm, giving facts. Straight from the horse’s mouth, as it were, since Jean herself was considered an Alpha-level mutant.

“Did Winters manifest other powers?” Keen asked.

“He…was a telepath, I know,” Jean floundered, a little, looking at Scott.

“He could t-t-teleport, too,” Scott put in. “He…he could…aw-waken l-latent ab-bilities. He—he b-b-broke into p-p-power plants. D-d-d-did s-s-something with the r-reactors. I was j-just the wr-r-r-recking crew. G-got him in.” He tapped his glasses, juicing up for a fraction of a second, before letting the beams die down. Just to show them.

He didn’t miss the shift in their body language.

 _They’re armed_ , Jean informed them unnecessarily.

 _So’re we_ , Rogue thought defensively.

Scott’s heart was going kind of fast. He was gonna go under, again. This…this wasn’t…this was too much. Too much. Too much.

A gentle nudge in his mind. A squeeze of his non-injured hand.

He was back. God. This…God.

“S-Sorry, are…are we f-f-finished?” Scott managed to murmur.

The two agents carefully didn’t look at one another, and it was finally Keen—because she was riding lead. She was the one in charge—who nodded. “If we have other questions, we’ll reach out to you.”

* * *

“Mr. Summers’ guardian was abusing him for years, and now he ends up dead,” Agent Malik said succinctly, case file in hand. Keen tailed her, walking quickly.

They had sent the kids off to be taken back to their vehicle. That Summers kid hadn’t been looking too good, at the end. Revisiting this kind of trauma took a toll, if you weren’t prepared for it. That’s what Ressler’s stupid therapist would say, anyway. He’d had to undergo lots of training and grief counselling so that he could do his job.

Scott Summers, for all he was a legal adult, was still just a kid.

Apparently, he could look at someone and blow their head off. But he was still a kid.

Ressler limped gamely along, not complaining when Keen and Malik outstripped him by more than five paces. “The same injuries he inflicted on the kid,” he said, and he was still the job, he was man enough to let Keen ride lead, he was man enough to not take offense when Malik made no move to show the file to him, or when Keen stood right in front of the rest of the pile, a good five inches thick, full of medical records for the victims.

Clear body language. ‘Head of the table,’ stance, squared shoulders—she wasn’t going to release any bits of this case lightly.

“Normally, any other family would be the suspect…but that doesn’t fit. This was…an abnormal situation,” she was saying. “Even if Scott had other family who might want to take revenge…what about the other victims?”

Ressler kept his mouth shut. He had nothing.

Keen, though, was still thinking. Her mind still working a million miles a minute, trying to think like a criminal. Like Reddington fucking told her to.

“Unless…it’s the same motive,” Keen said then, and Ressler didn’t grin when she met his eyes first, before glancing over at Malik.

“Our unsub’s somebody who targets the abusers,” Ressler got it quickly.

“Like a vigilante killer,” Malik said. She was quick, too, and she looked at Ressler before looking back to Keen. Interesting. She was still playing this long game, trying to figure out who to trust, with this whole ‘mole’ situation. And, if this was any indication of her having tells, it meant she was more apt to trust Ressler than Keen.

Made sense. Ressler would hardly be a mole and then turn around and get himself injured so badly.

“Let’s run background checks,” Ressler said. There was a time to be thinking about this stuff, but now wasn’t it. Now, they were doing a job. “We need to know what other victims have loved ones with identical injuries.”

And thinking on it, it really did make sense. Because the victims really didn’t have a connection, otherwise. And Winters was the only mutant.

But you didn’t have to be a mutant to hurt people. Regular old human DNA was still good for that.

* * *

Karl looked at his watch. It was almost time for his shift to begin. He had timed this perfectly, then. He had just finished brushing Mother’s long, white hair.

“Beautiful. See, Mother?” he said, and kept his tone pleasant. Not too quick. Like he expected her to answer him, if she wanted to. Conversational.

She wouldn’t, of course. She was pretty far gone, when it came to verbal communication.

“Some things do remain the same,” Karl continued. Like her house. Her knick-knacks adorned the mantle, her tastes in furniture, paint, and even the hardwood floors, which he’d had restained a few years ago, rather than replaced. Stability. Routine. These were important, for older people.

“Okay. I have to go to work now,” Karl said. He put down the brush and backed up, pulling her wheelchair with him, parking it in her regular place in front of the television. “Yes, I know. I don’t wanna leave you either…” he leaned in to look her in the eyes. Eye-contact was important when communicating. Especially with Mother, who didn’t do so well with verbal communication, anymore.

Not that she returned his gaze. She wasn’t present, right now. She often…slipped away.

“But I promise I’ll be home soon,” Karl finished. He didn’t kiss her cheek. He turned up the television, though. CNN. News. She liked news.

He wondered, briefly, if she realized when they talked about him. Knew what they called him.

‘The Good Samaritan.’ Hmm. It should make her proud, if she did realize. They named him after one of the parables of Christ. That was something she would appreciate. Not for her, really. Mother hadn’t ever been much for religion. But her mother had. So that sort of thing would have more clout.

His calling as the Good Samaritan coincided well with his job. He worked as a…’substitute nurse’ of sorts. Always on loan to different hospitals in the tri-state area and beyond. His patients were randomly selected, which helped immensely when he found someone to exact his own brand of ‘justice’ on.

Kept the police from finding him, anyway.

This afternoon, he was back at DC General Hospital.

He got checked in and began his rounds. He got the files for his patient and huffed, a little.

This was why he had a job _and_ a calling. He was needed. Even coming mere days from his latest retribution, there was never _rest_.

“Mrs. Wilkinson, you have had quite a year,” he said aloud. Kept his tone light. “Three trips to the ER in the past 10 months. Detached retina, concussion, fractured jaw…and now a broken wrist.”

Huh. That was a funny coincidence. A broken wrist was what had led him to his last calling.

She was holding said wrist out to him, and he obligingly squeezed her fingers, checking for how fast the capillaries refilled.

“You can see all that?” she asked. Not…afraid. Good. Just curious.

“In your file,” Karl tilted his head toward the screen behind him, moving to the drawers next to the examination table. Gauze. He’d need gauze.

“I’m a total space cadet,” she said, not very convincingly. “I guess I should try to be more careful.”

She didn’t see him looking at her, when she cast a fearful glance over her shoulder, through the room’s transparent walls.

To a huge man waiting outside the room, pacing uneasily. He was more than a foot taller than Karl, and broader. He was built for strength. Like a linebacker, maybe.

Interesting.

“I guess so,” Karl said noncommittally in response to Mrs. Wilkinson’s statement.

Jack Winters had been bigger than Karl, too. And a mutant, besides.

Size didn’t matter. He had a specific skill set.

And now, he had some more research to do.


	4. Cause and Effect

“Scott, ya hafta eat somethin.’”

Scott had been coaxed into the diner with the promise of coffee, but hadn’t touched whatever Rogue had ordered for him.

His head wasn’t throbbing, simply because Jean was there, but he also knew it was time to take the pills for his wrist, and that they’d work better if he had more food in his system.

He was leaning into the back of the booth, and he _wasn’t_ crossing his arms because the stupid cast made it awkward, but he sure wished his ‘fuck off’ body language was stronger.

“You don’t mean that, Scott. Eat some bacon, then you can take your pill,” Jean chastised gently.

His withering glare was likewise either misinterpreted or unseen behind the stupid sunglasses.

“What doesn’t he mean?” Rogue asked Jean pointedly, because Scott hadn’t said anything since leaving the black site.

“He’s upset because he can’t properly convey ‘fuck off’ body language because of his cast,” Jean said matter-of-factly, not even tripping over the swear.

Rogue grinned. “Aw, hell, Summers. Sure you can! Trust me. Ah’m a pro.”

Scott sighed, leaning forward and resting his elbows on the table. When Jean poked a fork in his direction with bacon on it, he took it, eating the bacon begrudgingly.

“You have the—the—the w-w-withering g-glare,” Scott mumbled.

Jean was ready, chasing the bacon with a glass of orange juice even as Scott sat up, leaning back to access his pocket; he had a mini pill case for when he forgot the bottle, and pushed the pain pill between his teeth, draining the orange juice to swallow it, and then stabbing half-heartedly at a rubbery bit of overcooked egg.

“Top three emotions?” Rogue asked softly, and Scott frowned, but played along.

It was something they did, back in the day, when a bunch of them were up with night-terrors. Their little Dysfunctional Teen Mutant Club.

“T-T-Tired. C-Confused. P-p-p-pissed off.” The egg tasted better than it looked. He reached for the bottle of ketchup, proceeding to tap it out onto his hash browns.

“Ah’m pissed off, too. Then…anxious. And maybe a little Confused,” Rogue said, nodding. A gloved hand snaked a triangle of Scott’s toast, and he let it.

“Anxious, too,” Jean ticked off her fingers, playing along. “Confused. Then…um…satisfied.” She was the only one without food in front of her. She was the only person Scott knew who genuinely tended to adhere to set mealtimes, and was pretty good about limiting any kind of emotional snacking. She was a very active sort of person, and it wasn’t a…diet thing. It was just a health thing. 

But at her words, Scott and Rogue looked at her, eyebrows raised in question, and Jean…flushed.

“It’s…dark. Sorry. But…I feel…um…satisfied. Vindicated. Be-because the world is safer, without Jack Winters in it.” She busied herself taking a long draw of her water, but then coughing when it went down the wrong pipe.

“Shit, Jean,” Rogue’s face split into a grin, again, and Jean’s face went, if possible, redder than her hair.

Jean hadn’t regularly attended any “meetings” of the late-night club, (if, indeed, it had been any kind of official club; the only semi-regular attendees had been Scott and Rogue and Kurt. Jamie, when the New Recruits came. (Rogue said she always suspected Rahne listened in from where no one could see her.)) despite knowing she would be more than welcome. Scott knew that, in spite of her power, Jean was a very private person, and their impromptu sort of…unsanctioned group therapy? Hadn’t always left the best taste in her mouth. (Jean was weird about those kinds of things. She hadn’t grown up with the same issues that a lot of the students took with authority figures.)

“We all said ‘confused,’ rahght? Any thoughts on that?” Rogue prompted at length, when Jean’s face had calmed a little.

“W-w-what the act-actual f-f-fuck is up with my head, that I’m –I’m—I’m s-s-stuttering?” Scott pushed out, scowling and flagging their server for a refill on his orange juice.

“That was actually mah point, too,” Rogue nodded. “Jean?”

Jean looked thoughtful. “Some kind of regression is normal. It’s a trauma response. Think of it as an extension of your basic ‘fight, flight, or freeze.’ Regressing is just a way of escaping your present anxieties. And you described losing time? That’s dissociating, which is another ‘flight’ response. Your mind can’t process the entirety of your emotional baggage connected with…all of this.” Jean moved her hand in a circle, as if gesturing to Scott’s invisible baggage on a platter.

Rogue scowled. “All rahght, Miss ‘I may have swallowed a psych book.’ But what can we do about it?”

Jean frowned, obviously a little put out by Rogue’s barb, but choosing to ignore it. “I’m not a therapist. I’m going into medicine, not psychiatry.” She looked at Scott. “I think it would help to talk about it. But I’m not a professional. I think you should ask the Professor.”

Scott sighed. He was afraid she would say something like that. “W-w-what ab-bout you? C-c-c-confused?”

“Oh, it’s just…it’s about the case, actually,” Jean said carefully. “I was just wondering how the…the killer…was able to subdue Jack. I just…got to thinking. He was…a very powerful Alpha-level mutant. And he’d stayed out of any legal trouble for…years.”

“Yeah,” Rogue said slowly. She ticked off powers on her fingers as she listed them. “You said…what? He did that thing with his skin…he could teleport? Rahght?”

“He was a telepath,” Jean continued, nodding, “and…” she looked at Scott, as though for verification. “You said he…he could do other things?”

Scott shrugged. He was going under. He couldn’t talk about this. He couldn’t talk about this.

_He’d been late. The bus had run late._

_And Jack had thrown a chair at him._

_The chair. It was broken, now. It had hit the wall next to Scott with enough force to put a hole in the drywall. The metal legs had disconnected and twisted; the screws still firmly attached to the plastic that had broken off jaggedly from the seat of the chair._

_Scott had just looked at the broken chair._

_It had hit the wall a foot from Scott’s face._

_Just a little to the left, and it would have caught Scott right in the head._

_His legs had gone weak, then, and he’d shakily sunk to the floor._

_“Wastin’ time makin’ nice—I told you not to talk to anyone! You can’t con a con! You think you can just bail on me? I own you! Who else would take a freak like you?! Who found you when you were runnin’ from the cops?! Who didn’t send you back to the fuckin’ system?! Me! You need a reminder?! You want I should kick yer face in?! Brand my name on yer fuckin’ forehead?!”_

_Jack_ loomed _over Scott, whose heart was rabbiting in his chest. He staggered back upright when Jack’s hand fisted in his hair, flinching hard. “Don’t,” Scott had choked, and Jack pushed Scott’s face against the wall._

_“Don’t what?” he growled. “I can do whatever the hell I want to you! I own you,” he said again._

_And then he’d proceeded to beat Scott until he was bloody and gasping on the floor._

_And then he’d kept beating him._

“—an ahce-cube. Can you—Scott? Can you feel that? And the smell? That’s ketchup, Scott. On accout’a how you drowned a perfectly good plate’a hash browns.”

 _God, Scott,_ breathe _. In and out. Okay? Okay?_

“C’mon, Summers. Help me out. We did touch and smell. What’s somethin’ you see?”

Scott inhaled a shuddering breath, blinking slowly.

Assess.

He’d lost time.

How long?

“Ah’ll pick again. Ah see yer orange juice. The cup is blue, and you haven’t had any, yet. That cute server just refilled it. Remember? D’ya see that, Scott?”

Panic attack protocol. Re-calibrating his senses.

Grounding him.

_Scott, breathe again, okay? In and out._

He did so, and the breath was much more filling. Still shaky, though.

“Hearing. Scott, what’s somethin’ you hear?”

Scott registered the small gloved hand in his, again. She was holding his hand. Rogue.

“You,” he gasped, and Jean’s relief was palpable, even as Rogue offered a lazy grin.

“Good,” Rogue said. “How ‘bout taste?”

“O-orange j-j-juice.”

“I’m gonna pay. Meet at the car?” Jean slid out from her booth seat, and only then did Scott realize that Rogue was next to him, on his side of the booth.

“Lost ya there, Summers. Shitty of us to trigger you that bad. Ah’m sorry,” Rogue murmured. “Can you stand, yet?”

Scott shook his head jerkily. His heart was pounding too hard, and his hands were tingling all weird and he wasn’t…there. Not all the way.

“How’s your wrist?”

Scott shrugged. “S-s-same,” he croaked.

He was exhausted.

Reliving trauma was really goddamn exhausting.

“Wanna talk about it?”

Scott grimaced. “I’d r-r-rather n-n-not.”

“All rahght. That’s fahne,” Rogue murmured. “But if you do, Ah’m here. No questions asked.”

Scott let out a dry, humor-less chuckle. “There’s al-always qw-qw-questions. About—about J-J-J-Jack. M-m-mostly w-w-whys. And h-h-hows. S-so I’ll t-tell you th-the answer: Y-y-you d-do what you h-have to.”

And Rogue…just nodded. Didn’t push. “Makes sense,” she whispered. And squeezed his hand. Then, “Ah hope you know…it wasn’t yer fault. None of it. Not…what he did back then? And not what was done to him.”

Scott blinked, behind his sunglasses. “Y-you d-don’t know th-that,” he said in a low voice.

Rogue shifted in the booth, and she was still holding his hand in her gloved one, but her torso was completely facing him, now, and she was staring him down; her makeup was impeccable, and her purple sweater looked too hot, but she wasn’t sweating.

“Ah know it just fahne, Scott. None of what _he_ did is on you. _His_ actions. _His_ choices. Aren’t on you. And whoever killed him? That’s not on you, either. Fuck their investigation, and fuck their questioning. D’you understand me?”

Scott hesitated, but then straightened, and offered her an authoritative nod.

He couldn’t stutter a nod.

“Good. You up to standin’ yet?”

Another nod.

Rogue smiled in that real way—the soft way she did sometimes. It reached her eyes, without an undertone of sarcasm or fakeness.

“Well, all rahght then. Let’s get to it.”

* * *

The hunt for the mole was ongoing. Nothing was explicitly said, but it had become pretty clear whose alibis had been confirmed.

Who was innocent, and…who wasn’t.

Meera, it was relatively clear, had been declared safe. She had been on some special assignment from Cooper all day.

Which was fine. Liz wasn’t about to complain about it, since The Good Samaritan wasn’t even technically a Blacklister. And she was trying not to take it personally.

But catching The Good Samaritan _was_ important.

But…so was catching the mole. So was finding Reddington.

It was complicated.

And it wasn’t fair to start trying to compare. It was all important. Regardless of how she currently felt about her job. Or her marriage.

She stood, when Cooper descended the stairs, looking her area down with intent.

Good.

Elizabeth finally felt like she was making headway in this case. And when she had the records up, side-by-side, it started to look so obvious. _She had been right_.

“Every one of The Good Samaritan’s victims had a family member with identical injuries,” she said confidently, indicating the x-rays and charts she’d pinned on the board. Cooper looked…tired. But he was paying strict attention. So she continued. “Fractured skulls, broken bones, torn retinas,” she continued, pointing to each specific injury as she named it. “All of them either the victim’s spouse or child. All of them classic signs of physical abuse.”

“You think your serial killer only targets people who hurt others?” Cooper…looked at Ressler, then. Away from her.

Interesting.

“How else do you explain this?” Liz continued. It was all important. She could dissect it later. When she’d been cleared. Because she would be. Because she was innocent. And everything would…go back to relative normalcy, after, she hoped.

Or, you know. She could…move to Nebraska with Tom.

“Every one of these family members was at a different hospital, different insurance, different doctors,” Ressler said, flipping through the files. Contributing, because Cooper was looking at him. “There’s nothing that ties them together.”

Liz didn’t know if he was playing devil’s advocate, or if, suddenly, she was being suspicioned of being the damn mole or what. But she was right. She knew it.

She scanned the files she’d pinned on the board, looking for the linking factor. There had to be one.

“Yes, there is,” she said firmly, once she’d found it. “I’ll pull up the information, here. Aram?”

Aram…was gone. He wasn’t in. Liz…must have been more absorbed in her research than she’d thought.

“Um,” she said, recovering quickly, pulling up the information herself. “Nurse…Karl Hoffman. He…was on call every time one of the family members was brought into the ER.”

Cooper studied the driver’s license—Virginia—and nodded.

“He’s a locum tenens. He fills in for short-staffed hospitals, like a substitute teacher,” Liz said, and it made so much sense. They were on the right track. They were going to catch him, this time.

She looked up at the x-rays. One collection was different from the others; three x-rays, side-by-side, instead of two. Jack Winters, Scott Summers from a few weeks ago, and Scott Summers from when he was thirteen.

“We’re getting warrants for his home address and the last hospital he reported to,” Ressler added.

“Good. Get moving,” Cooper looked at Ressler, then back at Liz.

And then he was gone, and Ressler was looking at her.

“Let’s get moving,” Liz said, grabbing her coat.

“Where’s Aram?” Ressler said absently, limping after her.

* * *

The church was spacious and clean. The folding chairs were simple, set in a circle, and the people sitting in them—mostly men. Some held pamphlets, some folded their arms.

All looked intently at the man speaking. His name was George Wilkinson.

“I never want to hurt her,” he said. “I just…there’s this anger that takes over. It’s like I’m someone else, you know?”

Karl scoffed, inwardly.

“And we all know that powerless feeling, but it’s our addiction to power and control that leads to domestic violence,” replied a different man.

Karl raised a hand. “I’d like to share something. First time here. My name is Victor. I was a victim. My mother. She called it tough love. It was abuse. I refused to see her for nearly ten years, until I realized avoiding her and pretending those things never happened…”

 _It didn’t help_ , was left unsaid. Some men nodded. Most sat stoically.

“Took a long time, but I figured out a way to reconcile with her,” Karl went on. “It has been hard on both of us, but we’ve worked out a process. Call it…a home remedy…that has allowed us to move forward. And now…we’re closer than we’ve ever been.”

Finding Melissa Wilkinson’s husband had been so ridiculously easy. Not at all like the work he’d put in to fulfill his calling with Jack Winters.

It was like obstacles had melted away.

It was getting easier.

* * *

Elsewhere, in an undisclosed location, Aram Mojtabai was seated—not very gracefully—at a small table, and a black bag was yanked from his head. Upon the table were a laptop, a piece of paper, and a handtowel. Sitting across from him was Raymond Reddington.

“Hello, Aram,” Reddington said simply.

“What—what is this? Where am I?” Aram stammered, looking up at Reddington, and then over at Dembe, who had taken a post by the door.

“You’re going to do something for me,” Reddington intoned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Weirdly, things have settled down a little. I moved! And then it was Christmas! And then I got a new job! Super fun! 
> 
> But so time-consuming.
> 
> Have this! I'll write more of my things yet! I promise!

**Author's Note:**

> Aaand here we go! I've always liked this episode of 'The Blacklist,' and wondered what lovely applications it would have on certain other fandoms: a serial killer who targets abusers. 
> 
> As always, I'm mostly writing this for me. I'm the one who wants to read it, so I have to write it. Anyone else have that problem?


End file.
